Kaede Akagi, Haruko Rukawa
by Hannah Yeun
Summary: Getting close to someone can be as simple as 1,2,3...but not to these normal, basketball-loving students. When nature stepped in, they began to know more than what they think about each other -- their families, their secrets, pains and joys. *2 UP!*
1. The Surge

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_AUTHOR'S NOTES_

_I've been saving this story for the likely season shift from summer to rainy days, purposely, to coincide with the event that made this ordinary encounter between two SD characters more of an extraordinary one.  However, I have seen that the very idea of this plot has already been a concept of writing by some.  In whichever case, what you're about to read here is not at all similar to theirs. ^__^___

_Hope you all enjoy this one._

*   *   *

**~ Kaede Akagi, Haruko Rukawa ~**

**I**

**_The Surge_**

"I knew I'd find you here."

Rukawa turned upon hearing the familiar voice from behind.

A girl's head was peeking behind the door.

_…Now what does she want._

Haruko Akagi timidly stepped out of playful hiding and carefully shut the metal door after.  She then beamed him her most charming smile.

Anyone can tell by the way Kaede Rukawa looked at her that he's not amused.  Curtly, he acknowledged their captain's sister with no more than a gruff sigh.  When she just stood there lightly blushing in utter speechlessness, he looked away.

It was a gloomy Thursday afternoon at school.  And as always, Rukawa was alone on the rooftop at his usual spot near the ledge – back stooped, head perched over the metal railings, and hands loosely clasped as his elbows rested on the cold, steel banister that supported all the weight of his torso – seemingly dazed while overlooking the whole of Kanagawa from where he stood.  It was an unexpected sight for Haruko to have found him staring blankly into nowhere when she actually expected him to be in slumber, or simply hanging out while listening to his favourite music from his trusty walkman.  Apparently, he was different today.  Rukawa was in deep contemplation.

A gush of wind blew past him, gracefully tousling his hair away from prickling his eyes, and hence revealed more of the beauty that was already visible in his impassive and ashen face.  He welcomed it with blissful contentment; letting its fierce wafting relieve him of his tacit distress as the gust slowly cooled his body, as moisture slowly dampened his skin.  The cold draught was relaxing no doubt, but to him, it felt rather unusual.  Kaede looked up and saw flashes of brilliant light just above cumulus grey clouds gradually forming over the horizon.

_A lightning storm is coming…_

"You've been missing classes for the past three days now…and exams are already next week."  Haruko spoke suddenly, softly, after an ensued length of silence.  "You haven't been attending basketball practices either."

Rukawa's eyes shifted back at her, then he spoke in a very guarded tone of voice, "Is that why you're here?  To remind me of my laziness?"

For a moment, the girl stiffened from his petulant remark, feeling that it denoted more of an accusation than an enquiry.  "No!  I…I didn't mean to sound that way!" she was feebly shaking her head in defense.  "Since you haven't been showing up lately, oniichan went looking for you…to see if you're doing well.  He even asked some of your senseis to assist him in his search, but you were never there for your classes. Can't you see?  Oniichan is worried about you…and he's desperately finding a way to talk to you.  I just…I just…" Haruko trailed off, her gaze now riveted on the floor.  "I just volunteered to help out."

Kaede studied her in a brief moment and turned his back against her.  Somehow, he didn't quite hear the last words she just said.

"We're all worried about you, Rukawa-kun…

_(I, for one, am)_

…It just isn't like you to be acting this way all of a sudden."

He didn't bother to react.

She advanced warily, reluctantly placing a comforting hand on his broad shoulder when she stopped just inches away beside him.  "Is there something bothering you, Rukawa-kun?  Maybe I can do something to help."

Truthfully, he wouldn't have minded her good intentions and concern…but her mere nosiness simply irritates him.  Rukawa immediately deviated from Haruko's hand the moment he felt the sting of her touch cling to him. _ What a nuisance!_  He gave her one last indignant look before he turned on his heels and treaded for the door.

*   *   *

"_Rukawa-kun!"  Haruko called._

A thunderous roar violently shook the sky following its frequent flashing.   Streaks of lightning were now visible in the firmament. 

"Do you really _think_ I can entrust you my problems, Haruko?"  Kaede hissed; his unfeeling blue eyes darkened when he met her gaze.  "I never asked for your sympathy, or theirs.  Why don't you just leave me alone," He averted briskly, "And, for a change, try sticking your nose on Sakuragi's business instead.  That idiot needs more attention from you than I do."

Draft came rushing from behind her, suddenly blowing forcefully from the north.  Haruko's pale and weary face flushed from the tingling cold. However, she felt more of the chill on Rukawa's words than the wind's icy feel on her skin.

_R-Rukawa-kun…_

Haruko made a small step to follow him.  But as she did, she abruptly saw Kaede's retreating back double in a hazy mirage.  _N-Nanda?_  Hastily, she seized for the metal railings at her side to help her regain back balance.  Her legs suddenly felt like wooden stilts and her body began to sway uncontrollably.  Not much, but only a little.  Haruko moaned quietly, shut her eyes tight and let her light-headedness pass as the burning sensation from her neck reached her eyelids.  

The distress she had been manifestly nurturing for days of restless thinking and worrying was too much, even too tiring for her body to take.  She didn't realize that 'till only now.  On impulse, Haruko raised a hand over her mouth and let out a gravely cough.  She looked up, feared that Rukawa might have heard her, and then eased down when she saw that he didn't.  She cannot let herself be overheard that way, much less articulate what she was thinking now. 

_Why do you keep pushing me away?_

She could have cried the instant he shot her that last look before completely turning his back to leave.  Oddly, the thought of crying was too trivial to mind now than keeping herself from uncontrollably plopping on the floor, almost drained from all strength.

The event of her brother Takenori confiding to her last week about his agitation flooded back into her memory.  Haruko had no idea how long he'd been keeping silent for what he was feeling, but what he told her then nearly broke her to tears.  It wasn't just his words; it is how he said it.  He sounded confused, disappointed, and merely talked in strengthless whispers.  She felt his remorse and her heart went out to him instantly.  Being the confidante, she unknowingly carried the weight of his worries, along with it her own personal and undying longing for that man.  She had never seen her brother so serious about this—about Rukawa suddenly leaving the team without a word.  Just when everyone was ecstatic for the championship game that is only three weeks away.

Then all too suddenly, unexpectedly, her temperance started to give way to the overwhelming weight her frail heart can no longer carry.  She always kept an open mind on his side of the story, telling herself that maybe he _is just having a bad day, but something deep inside her is beginning to take form: a flower.  An enraged rose threatening to bloom…and it scared her.  Anger was unlikely, even impossible, for her to feel for someone she adored like Rukawa, though she knew for the fact that (sometimes) he can be uncaring, conceited, inconsiderately stubborn…_

Haruko promptly stopped herself from thinking, summoning control.  Her pulse now hammered wildly in her temples making her head ache.  She felt extremely tired – tired of going after him all this time – heavy, feverish, and anytime now, she expected to pass out.

Part of her had the sudden urge to just let him go, leave him alone as he obviously stressed and then wish him not to look back to say something that would hurt her again…but she couldn't.

_No._

She refused to let him go now.

She refused to let him go the way she did when she first met him in this very place, face-bloodied from Sakuragi's mad beating.  He blatantly refused her aid, not caring how that made her feel, and left.  She let him go, still, because _that is what he wanted.  Haruko will do anything he say.  But not this time._

She quickly gathered as much bearings as she could carry to confront him once more.  Standing straighter, she unclasped her hand from the metal railings that supported her.  This is for her brother.  This is for Shohoku.  

Haruko felt herself moving, walking, running.  

The championship is near.  Exactly a week away from the festival.  A good three weeks, in all.  And the team is in need of an ace…

They are in _dire need of Kaede Rukawa._

*   *   *

"Matte yo!"  

Rukawa heard Haruko call to him once more but had no intention to comply.  Then for a second, he saw her run pass his left side and stood directly in front of him.  He stopped pace, and then frowned at the sight of her standing awkwardly between him and the door with an expression of mixed agitation and weariness.

"You could at least talk to my brother if you don't feel like opening up to me." She pleaded, looking back at him with glassy, solemn eyes.  "Please…do talk to him now.  Promise me you'll do that before you go."

He glowered at her, definitely more annoyed than ever.  "Out of my way."

"_The team needs you!  How could you just abandon them like this!_"

Rukawa gritted his teeth.  Like her, he had been controlling his temper.

Then his head quickly snapped up upon the skip of his heartbeat when he perceived the crashing sound of the heavens growing louder and deadlier by the second.  There was movement among the clouds, and then he heard the leaves rustling from flailing branches against the angry wind.  The school's newly installed lightning rods, the higher one erected on the main building and the other one on top of the small platform just above them, suddenly became an eyesore to him.

If he would get out, he had to do it now…

And quick!

The hair on Rukawa's head began to stand.  He began to shove her aside.

"Please!  For once, listen to me, _please!"_

"Damn it, Haruko!  I have no time to argue with you!"

He grabbed hold of the door latch…

…She grabbed hold of his arm…

Then lightning stuck the rod above them.

Intense amount of electricity surged through their bodies rendering them helpless.  The current continued to rush uncontrollably to the lower floors, hitting and spreading on every metal conductor it can get its voltage on – from the student's lockers on the empty hallway, to the windows' metal frames and panel.  Three clear glass casements vibrated and shattered in an instant.

A final spark broke Rukawa's contact with the latch.  That sudden outburst of energy hurdled Kaede and Haruko on the concrete some two meters away from the door.

Their bodies lie motionless.

No one knew how long their hearts stopped beating…

**Tsuzute (to be continued)**

*   *   *

_I might have overdone Rukawa in this chapter but, hey, the guy has his reasons.  ^__^_

_Do let me know of what you think about this chapter, ok?  I really need to hear from you. _

_ Thanks, minna!_

*   *   *

**+++ Slam Dunk is a copyright property of Mr. Inoue Takehiko and IT Planning, Co. +++**

**+++ Disclaimer applies to the entirety of this story ++**


	2. The Switch

*   *   *

_To Stephen and Amy…most especially, to Rose – my muses_

*   *   *

**~ Kaede Akagi, Haruko Rukawa ~**

**II**

**_The Switch_**

The series of lights stretched over the wide, empty hallways of the junior building were flickering; not the dreamy, hypnotic type of glaring and dimming characterized in perfect synchronization with a clock's ticking – one _tick_ second, on…one _tick_ second, off – but it was an erratic type of flickering variedly sectioned by millisecond pauses, like someone doing a horridly practiced Morse code with a flashlight.  And in the stillness, one could vividly hear a soft _kzzz-kzz_ sound of static electricity underneath one of the parallel lights as all the fluorescents sputter radiance.

The freshmen's hallway – located two floors up the ground area of the student bike stand and admin car park – would generally pass for a look of a muddled back yard.  On the left wing from the main staircase, old and damaged lockers had been opened and books were hurled out from inside.  Papers marked with the teacher's red ink (_definitely exam results) were strewn all over the floor, with some already browned at the edges as if it were touched by flame.  On the right wing, and on the wall across the students' lockers, flanked the full-size memorabilia glass display exclusive to the high school sports committee.  Inside, what the students usually call "the spike" and human-figured trophies had toppled over on the second shelf – three of which had fallen a ledge lower, and _more_ of which were left suspending, looking like gold and copper stalactites as these were jammed between the glass panel and the ledge's rim.  The single grand trophy cup on the top shelf remained tall for surviving the havoc, but the huge portrait of the entire Shohoku Basketball Team beside it seemed close to splitting in half.  Many of the plaques, glass-plated Certificates of Recognition, and figurines of popular sports pioneers – Pelĕ, McGwire, Williams, and Jordan – all lie on the floor as well, not to mention the 12-inch wooden statuette of a softball player losing his head and throwing arm._

Shards of broken window glass speckled the smooth, marble-white floor.  Its shiny bits and pieces glimmered beautifully under the sputtering light of the hall like crystal river water…and for a brief moment, the parallel fluorescents held their radiance and static humming before finally dying down all together.

Subsequently, muted footsteps of someone beginning to run upstairs towards the rooftop from the floor landing were heard.  Then a muted sound of a metal door being yanked open, and a muted sound of it being slammed shut.

Darkness now encased the hallway in a peaceful gloom.  Icy strokes of moonlight gleamed through the open window easily and now colored the shards of glass a pale white.  Undefined shadows – which used to be opened locker doors, strewn books and papers, memorabilia trophies and toppled figurines on the floor – seemed to protrude every corner and every side against the mild luminescence coming from the window.

Alas.  Hours of daylight had indeed passed.

*  *  *

_"Hey…"_

Haruko heard a female voice so far away echo deep within her mind, its familiar tune jerking her slightly back to her senses from flashback scenes – typical scenes one would hardly consider significant in their lives, like seeing people cross the street during a green light, or seeing a dog piddle on the nearest fire hydrant.  But in this case, the scenes she saw took place at the school grounds, the freshmen's hallway, the cafeteria, and the basketball court…even at her own bedroom.  

Before she could equally make anything out of these accounts and start questioning (more importantly, realize how a single, proverbial word from an ethereal voice had found its way to her, and had freed her from the deepest part of her sleeping state), different faces of various expressions had also been swarming in her mind like a horde of locusts, overlapping one after the other and quickly passing before her, then trailing off like stray, colored headlights in a big city street.  Visions of them were hardly clear to see, but somehow she could accurately tell one face from another as each image came by successively: okasan, otosan, oniichan…_Rukawa_…the girls – Matsui and Fuji, Ono-sensei (her English teacher), Yohei and the gundan…_Rukawa_…Ayako and Anzai-sensei, Sakuragi…_Rukawa…_

She felt a soothing, tingling sensation coming from the base of her head as the locusts started to disperse, and then it came crawling down her body until she was beginning to feel her hands, her back and her legs, like someone coming out of a painful cramp.  Haruko felt that she is finally taking _physical form, since during the flashbacks, she felt that – given the feeling of extreme weightlessness – she was mainly composed of eyes.  _

_"Hey…"_

Her left index finger twitched.  A sudden waking reaction.  And at that, Haruko instantly found herself in a dark open space where no images of any sort crossed before her.  There were no traces of locusts anywhere, and at that, she knew she was already awake.  It's a fact she can't refute.  Though her eyes remained closed, she could tell, since she can feel her left cheek pressed on something solid, but didn't have the faintest idea where she really is.  

As far as she can recall, she was there on the rooftop, _alone_ with Kaede Rukawa.  (After class, she went up there and tried her luck, for the umpteenth time, of finding him asleep.)  They talked a little, but not like any of her pleasant encounters with party acquaintances.  She remembered she was begging, pleading for reasonability, and he being defiant.  He had been defiant from the start.  Then she remembered him pushing her aside, and her grabbing him by the arm.  From that point onwards, she simply couldn't remember.  

She knew she fainted – it's another fact she would not dare contest.  She fainted holding Rukawa's arm.

_That would be embarrassing, the deeper part of her said suddenly.  _That would be _the__ most_ embarrassing thing that can happen between you and Rukawa.  I mean…surely it didn't happen that way – of course not! – because if it _did _happen, believe me, I can hardly imagine him doing something _good__ about the scenario…or doing something good__ to you__._

What if it did happen?  Haruko thought.  What if he felt her tugging at his arm a little when she lost consciousness?  Would Rukawa catch her from falling on concrete?  Would Rukawa cup a hand on her cold face, study her wan features and then realize that something is wrong with her?  Would he slid his arms beneath her and carry her safely to the clinic for treatment?  Or would he simply keep her under his protective embrace until she finally awakens?

Would he do that?  Would he really, _really_ do that?

_Would he even **care**? the voice returned._

_"Hey…Akagi…"_

But the echo she kept hearing was not even Rukawa's if she really _is_ in his arms waking her up.  For all she knew, it could be her own conscience waking her if he simply decided to leave her there…but it's obvious to her that _that_ assessment doesn't make any sense.  _A person's conscience is as unconscious as they are when they faint, she reminded herself.  If this isn't Rukawa, it should__ come from someone else.  It _must_ come from someone else.  A picture of an old woman seated in her rocker looking out the patio one fine spring morning suddenly took frame in her mind.  Then she thought otherwise: _Could this only be a dream?__

_Oba~a~san? she felt her mouth drawling the word but nothing came out.  Her eyes slowly opened, only to see nothing but pitch black.  Then the darkness started to simmer down, making her see something gradually taking forming – a vague figure – something waving swiftly across her face, something like…a hand splayed open._

_Obasan? I- Is that you?___

She felt someone shook her.  And again.  

"Hey!"  

The echo, which now registered a clear voice, sounded a little sullen and relatively impatient.  She just realized that the calls didn't come from the old woman – her grandmother – in her rocker, or any of her dear relatives who passed away, but rather it came from someone looking over her and is staring at her right in the face.

She got up, moaned in pain and fell back instantly at the sudden pang of a terrible headache.  Her body still felt a little heavy – oddly heavier than she remembered – and all shaky.  She successfully predicted her collapse before; now it looks like she's going to have a fever.

"Are you all right?"

Slowly, she opened her eyes again and saw a silhouette next to her.  She blinked once or twice for her vision to clear.  

"Ru…Rukawa-kun…" now she heard a bland, low-pitched tonecome out of her vocal chords, "…is that…you…?"  

Her eyes widened when she found herself staring at cold blue eyes…

_…HER big and round blue eyes._

She blinked again, and then violently shook her head.  It was like those times when Haruko would doubt herself from seeing something hardly believable, that there is a _need_** for her to shake her head, probably to call upon a second opinion on a fresh eye and a fresh mind.  _Am I _still_ dreaming?_**

That girl, **_Haruko Akagi_, the person kneeling next to her – looking physically real than a mirror reflection, her real-life double _frowning _at her – met her horror-struck gaze when she looked into those eyes once more.**

"Yes.  It's me."  Her double answered her previous question, and she spoke with a tone so flat and indifferent anyone would recognize it right away as belonging to _KaedeRukawa – regardless of whoever said it._

She began to scream…but the scream came out incredibly and undeniably _mannish_ – not the usual sharp, penetrating shrill she remembered belting out back at her junior high school days when the class joker played a prank on her and showed her a disgusting toy of a sewer rat.  The ghastly sound of her tone promptly made her cover her mouth with both hands.  In a snap, she was up her feet, immediately scurried off then poised herself as far away from _that girl – or whoever it is doing that sick impersonation of her – as she could possibly go._

Now she found herself staring at that girl again, feeling her eyes widening and bulging more from its sockets the longer she stared.

Her double wore an impassive face as she crudely stared back without even reacting at her sudden escape.  She noticed a tint of pink on the right cheek, and the girl's bloodshot eyes were firmly locked onto her like a target shooter to a big, red bull's-eye.

Haruko's horror made her look down at her big, clammy palms…her unsteady feet.  She was wearing a wide, size-11 black leather shoes and a boy's sterling blue uniform.

_"M-Ma…Masaka…!"_

She felt a sudden charge of shudder rapidly making it's way up to her shoulders.  At that instance, she had literally gone cold, and her mouth gone dry.  Slowly, ever so reluctantly, she reached up and touched her features.  The way the contours felt on her fingertips as she steadily ran both hands across her features – a wider forehead, thick brows, perfectly bridged nose, a prominent jaw line…a face a little elongated than she remembered having – suggests that what she is feeling is, without doubt, not hers.  She began to pat-stroke her hair that ran short from the nape.  No.  Kami-sama, no.  She felt her strong arms, her flat chest, her lean lower back, her…

"Hey," her glaring double said suddenly, "stop touching _me_."

Haruko sagged a little, not knowing what to react.  For some reason, she began to feel the familiar, warm prickles stinging her eyes again.  _No.  Kami-_sama.  _NO._  She felt a heavy lump blocking her throat, but somehow she managed to the spill the words out in painful, forced croaks: "W-W-What…are you…saying?"

Her double finally stood from her kneeling position and faced her.  "You heard me clearly, Haruko, I know.  And I know what you're thinking…so don't make me tell it to you twice," the girl half-raised her arms at the sides and looked down at her small feet, heels together – examining her form as a girl would examine herself in a new dress – "As you can see for yourself, you are _not_ where you're supposed to be…"

Haruko's mind went numb, and the cold feeling came haunting back.  

She – the girl inside **_Kaede Rukawa_ – screamed once more.**

*  *  *

"Stop screaming, do'ahou!  You sound disgusting!"  Haruko Akagi snapped, covering her ears at the sudden outburst of his terrible howling.

Submissively, and just instantly, Rukawa clipped his lips to close.  Then he started to sob quietly, his shoulders jerking up and down, as he fought hard to keeping back tears.   

An awkward silence fell between them.

Haruko eyed the tall man from foot to head.  His stiff body was quivering uncontrollably, fists clenched at the sides, knuckles white.  Again, she didn't have to guess what was going on in his head.  Confusion, fear, and distress were already clearly written on his face.  

Unable to contain his emotions any longer, Rukawa fell on his knees, his hands cupped on each side of his head, and wept.

Haruko remained where she stood, her face still bearing the air of stoic calmness, doing nothing, thinking nothing.  She raised her head up, fought the urge to close her eyes while basking into the moon's chancy radiance, and merely stared at it blankly.

The moon was in its last quarter, but it shone brightly more than any sky-rise building she knew of in the big city of Kanagawa – or even Tokyo – that is now at rest from the hectic morning under the cloak of darkness of this extremely peculiar night.  

Haruko took a deep breath, levelled her head back and began to stride towards Kaede.  She looked down on that man, looming over him, watched him literally quiver at her feet, now hugging himself to still his body's irrepressible trembling.  _He, the man inside her, had never seen himself this…this…(he hated to admit it) _pitiful_ before.  _

"Enough already.  You've almost drained every tear gland in my eyes."  She scoffed in a Rukawa-like tone when she noticed a small puddle of tears forming on the concrete.

"It's no use crying, you hear me?  Whatever that has happened here is hardly our concern anymore." She paused, thinking of something _more sensible to say that would probably spring up hope some from Rukawa.  And, of course, to make him quit crying.  "There's nothing we can do about it…for now.  This is only temporary…so stop that now.  Okay?"  _

Rukawa didn't make any effort to answer back.  Rather, he kept on shaking his head as if forcing himself to wake up from this nightmare they're both into.

Haruko cursed herself silently.  She remembered overhearing how her aunts from the mother side would brutally cow at her father, telling him that man's age-old curse was the inability to hush a woman from crying, when her parents, at that time, where in the middle of a little quarrel – eventually making her mother cry – and her father can't do a thing to comfort her.  Her father begged, even went down on _both his knees, but still, he was forced to spend the night alone in his tatami at the garden.  The kneeling and begging scene was a hilarious site to a child, but right now – in probably the most difficult part of her life, next to exceeding Sendoh's basketball abilities – she was not even in the mood to smile._

Did she ever?

"Listen…Akagi," she bent over, attempting to touch him on the shoulder, her inner voice resisted – _defiantly – then quickly withdrew her hand and stood straight, forgoing the attempt, "Listen, Akagi, this is not as bad as you think it is.  Be glad we're still alive after almost being struck by lightning."_

He just cried.

Haruko knelt – still not touching him – searched for something in her right pocket and handed a clean hanky to Rukawa.  "Here.  You're a tidy girl so I know you carry one of these."  She held it forward.  "Now wipe that thing off your face before it gets all smudgy and sticky."  

Rukawa's crying grew annoyingly loud.

"Shut up!  I told you to stop it already!  You're not helping anyone with your useless whining!"

This time, he looked up, glared with those swelling blue eyes, and slapped her hand away from his face.  Insane as Haruko would find it, but somehow she expected him to mutter a little "_Do'ahou!_" under his breath but no curses came – just quick, erratic sobs.  

Then again, _why did she expect it to come, in the first place?  She knew he couldn't possibly say that, to her (most especially to her) _or_ to any one else.  He's not the same old Kaede Rukawa which everyone regarded as an ice block, isn't he?  (Oh yes, she's __fully aware of that.) He's not the same old Kaede Rukawa the Shohoku High Basketball Team had been looking up as an ace, isn't he?  He's not the same old Kaede Rukawa that dared match Kanagawa's top seed to date by the name of Akira Sendoh, isn't he?  Nor is __he the same old Kaede Rukawa this annoying girl fancied, isn't he?_

…And neither is _she the same old annoying girl who fancies a certain Kaede Rukawa._

Haruko should know these truths by heart, and _un-der-stand_ more than ever – more than this despicable man before her, more than any practical, sensible and God-gifted creature in this crazy, dreadful world – as long as she lives.

"_Tch_."  Haruko got up and darted back, her chin up.  "Suit yourself."  She sidestepped pass him and headed for the door.

Rukawa eyed her dejectedly as she reached for the metal latch.

Haruko stopped and gradually glanced back.  "I'm off to your place…." she now said softly, as if answering Kaede's inquiring look as to where she is going.  "I'm not gonna be miserable like you, you hear me?"

She saw it.  And what glinted deep into Rukawa's blue eyes was unmistakable anger.

"If you want to keep whining all night about what happened, that's fine with me.  If you feel sorry for yourself, you can stay here 'till morning and rot.  I don't really care.  But I won't punish myself for going home late…in a _different_ body.  You hear me.  I never wanted it, never even imagined it to happen.  Neither do you…"

Haruko faced front.  She saw herself staring at a pretty face reflected on the small, cracked door window.  Her fists clenched; she bowed her head.

"Fate is playing a game here, don't you see?  I'm just deciding to play along."   For countless times that night, she had been trailing off, naturally lost for words, but the way she conferred what she had just said spoke of obvious indifference though with equally obvious finality.  Of all the decisions she had made in her life before, this has been her best one yet: "I would go on everyday in my life from now on as **_Haruko Akagi_, until I find a way to get us back to our normal selves.  If this _is_ a game, I won't lose.  I promised myself not to…not in any game.  And _this is not a damn exception."_**

Her head snapped back up and stared at her reflection on the cracked door window once again, "If you're sobered, I advise you to do the same, but if you think otherwise…mind you that a mother and a sister are waiting for **_Kaede Rukawa_** to come back home from school.  In your case – I mean, **_Haruko's_ case – having parents and a gorilla-of-a-brother doesn't make any difference."  She tugged the latch and pulled the door open, making a load metallic creak like saw cutting on metal.**

"I chose to move on, **_Rukawa_.  And in my decision, I want to make it clear that _who I am_, is _still who I am.  I may be _you_ in their eyes, but I'd like to keep my real self intact.  No pretenses, no masks.  Now decide what's best for you…for both of us."  At that, Haruko Akagi stepped into pitch-black darkness, which she now considered her _new life_.  _**

**Tsuzute (to be continued)**

*   *   *

_AUTHOR'S NOTES_

_Hope you didn't get dizzy reading this one.  I really apologize for the slight delay.  :-)_

_Work here is really taxing, but I'm doing my best in keeping a level head and straight schedule._

_Thanks for being patient!_

_Chapter 3 is up next._

*   *   *

**+++ Slam Dunk is a copyright property of Mr. Inoue Takehiko and IT Planning, Co. +++**

**+++ Disclaimer applies to the entirety of this story ++**


End file.
